The invention relates, in general, to an apparatus for automatic vehicle location, collision notification, and synthetic voice communication. In particular, the invention relates to a controller with a memory, a Global Positioning System, and means for wireless communication connectively disposed within a vehicle. More particularly the invention relates to a plurality of data structures stored in the memory wherein the data structures are formulated into instruction modules to direct the functioning of the controller.
Travel information has long been available to motorists of all types. Historically, motorists in all types of vehicles would ask route or travel directions from gas station attendants, and convenience store operators or they would consult a map of the local area in question. In 1967, the Global Positioning System (GPS) became commercially available. The GPS system consists of a plurality of satellites that are in orbit around the earth and beam positional information towards the surface of the earth. A receiver on the surface of the earth may, if desired, receive the beamed signals and is able to determine their relative positions. If the receiver is mounted in a vehicle such as an automobile, truck, airplane, or motorcycle, the relative position and direction of travel can be determined by receiving multiple GPS signals and computing the direction of travel. An example of this type of navigational system is produced by ALK Associates under the product name of CO-Pilot 2000.
The motorist, operator, driver, or user of the CO-Pilot 2000 system communicates with the system by entering information concerning this expected destination and CO-Pilot 2000 plots the trip using GPS information. The CO-Pilot 2000 may, if desired, enunciate approaching intersections and respond to voice commands from the user. This type of system is dedicated to the vehicle and the navigational information derived from GPS positional notation of the vehicle is for the users of the system and is not transmitted to a third party. If the user in the vehicle desires communication with a third party, he must use a wireless form of communication such as an analog or digital telephone i.e., cellular or PCS telephone.
An automatic communication link between a user in the vehicle and the third party can be established. Current technology permits collision detection of the vehicle and notification of the collision to a third party. The Transportation Group of Veridian Engineering Company manufactures a product entitled the Mayday System. The Mayday System combines Co-Pilot 2000 like technology with wireless telephone technology to produce a system that automatically communicates the vehicle""s position to a third party. The third party is a tracking station or base station that is operator attended. If the user is involved in a vehicular collision, the Mayday System senses the collision and notifies the base station via wireless communication. The actual vehicular collision sensors encode the collision event in digital data form and transmit the data to the base station. The receiving base station plots the data on an operator attended computer screen. The operator can visually recognize that a particular vehicle collision has occurred and can take appropriate action or perform a predetermined sequence of tasks. Examples of predetermined tasks may include contacting emergency services in the vicinity of the vehicular collision or communicating directly with the vehicle to determine the extent of damage to the vehicle, or injuries to the driver or vehicle occupants. In effect, the third party contacted by the Mayday system directs the efforts to a fourth party. The fourth party may be emergency services of some type or any other response to the directive data from the vehicle.
The Mayday system is predicated on the need for receiving the third party base station operator having a computer screen capable of plotting the received encoded digital information from the vehicle in order to determine its location. The user must also be physically able to respond to voice communications from the base station operator. The functional caveat of the Mayday System is that if no encoded information is received from the vehicle the base station operator will never be informed that a vehicular collision has occurred. If the user of the Mayday system is physically impaired due to the inability to speak or does not speak the language of the base station operator, the user cannot communicate directly with the operator.
It would be desirable to have an automatic vehicle location and collision notification system that would ascertain if a vehicular collision had occurred and communicate directly with an emergency facility. The system would notify an emergency facility in the vicinity of the vehicular collision without first notifying an intermediate operator who has to relay the collision event and possible emergency necessity to the emergency facility. The system would be capable of transmitting vehicle collision location data and pertinent data concerning the vehicle operator or occupants. It would be able to translate and transform this data into synthetic voice communication using any desired language for the present location of the vehicle. The synthetic voice communication would speak the vehicle collision location and pertinent data directly to a third party who would immediately dispatch emergency personnel to the collision location. If the system were unable to communicate with a first selected third party, the system would speak the data to a second or subsequent selected third party. This process of communicating would continue until a voice link between the system and a third party was established.
A motorist, operator, driver, or user of the present invention may at some point in his operation of a vehicle be involved in a collision with another vehicle or object. If the user is physically impaired or mute during pre-collision, collision, or post-collision he may not be able to with a recipient of an emergency communique or third party to gain emergency services.
The present invention is an apparatus for automatic vehicle location, collision notification, and synthetic voice communication to a selected recipient or third party i.e., emergency services, any subsequent desired recipient, or third party directly from the vehicle. The present invention does not rely on communication to the recipient or third party via a base-station operator who then relays the communique to the emergency service. The present invention may, if desired, communicate with any selected recipient or third party even if there is no immediate collision or emergency. An example of the user desiring to communicate with the recipient or third party is the user who is physically impaired and desires to communicate his present vehicle navigation position to the recipient or third party. The present invention may, if desired, be polled or interrogated as to the vehicle""s present navigational location. The polling or interrogating remotely may, if desired, be accomplished without notifying the driver or occupants of the vehicle. All transmissions of navigational location of the vehicle or attributes concerning the driver or other occupants of the vehicle are by synthetic voice. If desired all information or data collected during a collision may be manually retrieved either by synthetic voice or in digital data using a simple Text Editor with a laptop PC or equivalent connected to the system serial port.
The present invention has a computer or controller with a memory. The memory may, if desired, be a combination of types such as a read only memory as with a CD-ROM, an encoded floppy disk, a Read/Write sold state memory or random access either dynamic or static. A Global Positioning System and means for wireless communication are connected to the controller in the vehicle. The memory has stored therein a plurality of data structures formulated into interactive instruction modules to direct the functioning of the controller. The memory further has stored therein at least one navigational location record and statistical information about preceding events such as a collision profile.
A Global Positioning Module receives navigation or position data from the Global Positioning System. The Global Positioning Module selectively translates the received data into the vehicle""s present navigational position. An Automatic Speed Controlled Location Detection Module in communication with the Global Positioning Module dynamically searches the memory for a match between the vehicle""s present navigational position and the navigational location record. An Automatic Speed Controlled Collision Detection Module receives at least one vehicle collision indicator from at least one vehicle collision sensor. The Automatic Speed Controlled Collision Detection Module in communication with the Automatic Speed Controlled Location Detection Module formulates the match between the vehicle""s navigational position and the navigational location record into a collision event. A Data to Speech Translation Module in communication with the Automatic Speed Controlled Collision Detection Module translates the collision event into a synthetic voice. A Wireless Voice Communications Module in communication with the Data to Speech Translation Module and the means for wireless communication transmits the synthetic voice to the selected recipient or third party.
The present invention may, if desired, have a Dynamic Speed to Record Detector Range Converter in communication with the Automatic Speed Controlled Location Detection Module. The Dynamic Speed to Record Detector Range Converter has at least one range factor data structure relative to the speed of the vehicle. The range factor data structure transforms the navigational record into a look-ahead navigational record, whereby the Dynamic Speed to Record Detector Range Converter continuously communicates expected vehicle navigation position relative to the speed of the vehicle via the Data to Speech Translation Module. For example, when the vehicle approaches a street intersection the speed of the vehicle is ascertained and a -R-factor relative to that speed is appended to the approaching street intersection. When the vehicle is within a predetermined range or distance from the street intersection the Data to Speech Translation Module enunciates in a synthetic voice the name of the street intersection or any other desired denotation. The -R-factor is dynamic i.e., small values of -R- pertain to slower moving vehicles and larger values of -R- pertain to faster moving vehicles. With small values of -R-, street intersections immediately in range of the vehicle are enunciated. As the speed of the vehicle increase so does the -R- factor and range to the expected street intersection. For example, the higher the speed of the vehicle, the larger the -R- factor, the more distant the expected street intersection is enunciated by the Data to Speech Translation Module.
A Data to Speech Translation Module announces the approaching of a selected intersection location. The announced intersection location is derived, in part, from the look-ahead navigational record stored in memory. The look-ahead navigational record is continuously or dynamically updated as the speed of the vehicle changes i.e., larger or smaller values of -R-.
The Real Time Dynamic Scanning Database Module has logic or data structures that select a database file to match the current navigational position to the derived navigational position via GPS Data to Base Code Translation Module. The logic or data structures that command and control the database file to match the current navigational position or projected position to the derived or projected navigational position are formulated into a plurality of modules. The modules are a Location Database Module, a GPS Search File Database Module, and a Location Comparator-Indicator Module. The Location Database Module, GPS Search File Database Module and the Location Comparator-Indicator Module create a dynamic, real-time longitude and latitude random access database tracking system.
When taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and the appended claims, other features and advantages of the present invention become apparent upon reading the following detailed description of embodiments of the invention.